Today's Motherboard.TV：Eric Zimmerman

Motherboard.TVの最新映像を紹介。

今日はシリーズ『Oral History of Gaming（口頭で伝えるゲームの歴史）』の最新ビデオだ。ゲーム開発者であると同時にプレイ考案者でもあるEric Zimmermanはこんなコトを考えている： “ゲームをプレイをするコトで貧困や環境問題といった世界危機を救うコトが出来るのか？” とね。それから彼は『cat fights』や、マルチプレイが可能な大規模ゲームをネット上で流行らせたコトでも有名。
LINK : Oral History of Gaming: Eric Zimmerman and the Century of Play

『Oral History of Gaming』の第１話をまだ観ていなければ、コチラも観よう：

ゲームの先駆者・Ralph Baer
LINK : Ralph Baer and His All-Purpose Boxes

Today's Motherboard.TV : Gavin Russom

今週の『Motherboard.TV』を紹介。

今日からオンエアが開始されたエピソードは、〈DFAレコード〉を支える “魔法使い的プロデューサー／作曲家／ダンスの神様” 、Gavin Russomについてだ。彼はシンセサイザーなどのメカをまるで彫刻のように組み合わせ、素晴らしい聴覚体験を提供してくれる。

Electric Independence: Gavin Russom
http://www.motherboard.tv/2010/2/17/electric-independence-gavin-russom

Fuel: How One Guy Turned Fry Grease Into an Energy Revolution | Motherboard.TV

Back in 2004, America was blasting its way through Iraq to secure the Middle East, the danger of climate change (and the power of hurricanes) hadn’t yet hit Americans in the face, and pouring vegetable oil tossed out by fast food restaurants into gas tanks was something crazy hippies did. Well, one in particular: when Josh Tickell rolled across the country in a diesel van powered by a blend of ethanol and fry grease he sucked out of dumpsters, his five-year campaign had all the markings of a one-dude Carter-era here-comes-the-future pipe dream.

The thing was, his pipe didn’t belch a toxic brew of CO2, NO and other pollutants. It was as safe as it smelled — like french fries. Even better: vegetable oil was a heckuva lot cheaper than the alternative, which in 2004 was on its way to an all-time high. Turns out Tickell’s Veggie Van wasn’t a flash in the frying pan: it was on the bleeding edge of an energy movement so significant, it promised to replace petroleum-based fuel completely. It would also lead to a backlash over unintended consequences, like the rising food prices and water shortages biodiesel could cause in the developing world.

But Tickell’s not slowing down. In this installment of Motherboard, our own Eddy Moretti learned how he’s digging a new type of fuel — a biofuel based on algae, making it easier to produce, without the need of land or water — and taking his climate-changing, clean-burning, world-saving energy revolution to the masses with his organization and a new film. Yes, you can have fries with that.

Fuel: How One Guy Turned Fry Grease Into an Energy Revolution | Motherboard

Motherboard.TV : Carlos and His Heavy Metal Toys: The Man Who Built a 20-Foot Flamethrowing Exoskeleton

Mention Wasilla, Alaska, and presidential also-ran Sarah Palin leaps to mind like a caribou. But the southern Alaskan town’s more animated, engaging, and intelligent invention is easily a 20-foot-tall robotic mecha robot with flamethrowers for hands.

Look into the heart of this wire-wound, rust-streaked, red-metal exoskeleton and you’ll find its brain: the mild-mannered amateur inventor Carlos Owens, founder of Neogentronyx. When this former Air Force engineer and steelworker isn’t manning his one-ton, $25,000 hydraulic robot—equal parts Gigantor, Aliens, Starship Troopers—Carlos is tinkering with his other sci-fi-anime-inspired dream machines: a Hover Bike and a Sky Bike. They don’t really work right now, but we’re optimistic for a future launch if Carlos is.

Motherboard sent Thomas Morton out to talk to Carlos about his “Star-” inspirations, learn all about his blueprint development process, and to find out why it was he built his infamous “Big Red” in the first place. (Short and long answer: “Because I could.”)

This Week Motherboard : Cory Arcangel

This week Cory Arcangel invites us for a peep behind-the-scenes to see how his inimitable brand of internet-infused, code-heavy art gets made. Cory’s one of those rare artists who knows how to make digital art with heart and flesh and soul. With a catalog of work that often celebrates the unfiltered human weirdness and beauty piped to our homes as the internet, the conversation returns several times to the World Wide Web. When we ask Cory for a run down of his favorite internet videos, he shows us a few awesome ones—like this and this. We talk about his earliest work, the now infamous Super Mario Clouds, and the treatise he wrote on jpeg compression. Cory plays us part of his latest piece, a recreation of Arnold Schoenberg’s 1999 op. 11 Drei Klavierstücke comprised entirely of Youtube clips with cats playing piano. And for anybody out there making art as you watch along at home: Cory even gives some great encouragement and advice about the art making process.

Motherboard - Cory Arcangel

This Week Motherboard : Ralph Baer and His All-Purpose Boxes

勘の鋭い読者のみんなであればもうお気づきかもしれないが、最近『Motherboard』という番組が新たに設立された。そうだな、VBS.TVのテクノロジー版と思ってくれたらイイ。今日からココでも『Motherboard』の新着動画を紹介する。ちなみに『Motherboard』では１人１人がアカウントを作成でき、ナント自分の記事を投稿するコトも可能だ。そう、こんなにも身近なトコにキミの活躍の場が出来たってコトさ。さあ、みんなの知的好奇心でもって日本のテクノロジーを世界の連中に教えてあげてくれ！

Motherboard - Ralph Baer and His All-Purpose Boxes

Back in the late 60s, German-born gadgeteer Ralph Baer began inventing what later became known as video games. Over the ensuing decades he would develop Pong, the rifle you could point at the screen that was the precursor to the Duck Hunt shotgun, and the germ of countless other important concepts that the gaming industry is founded on. Simon, too! He invented that. He was also one of the first people to dip a toe in the murky waters now known as television commerce, but of course nobody with any money in the early 70s had much interest in latching onto the idea that people would one day impulse shop for crappy wares on their televisions. So Baer instead recast the idea, developing a small wooden video game console that attached to a TV and could bring untold hours of lo-fidelity entertainment to rich kids in the suburbs.